The Gifts Of A Break-Up

“NO, NO, NO — WE ARE OVER!”

That’s how that relationship ended. Per email. Recently. A relationship that I had thought would last. One that I had invested in. Deeply.

We had our ups and downs. Like most relationships. And we managed to make it work.
Unfortunately, not this time.
My attempt to explain, apologize and reset was ill-timed and pushed the wrong buttons.

“WE ARE OVER!”

That hurt. It still does. Sometimes.
I wish I could tell you that I was fine, that I moved on. After all, relationships are part of my professional work, we are both adults, and advice on how to get over break-ups is plentiful.

Instead, I embarked on a journey of blame and justification, thinly disguised as ‘search for explanations’. It didn’t help much.
It stuck even more knives in.

I started complaining about her, about the time and energy I had ‘wasted’ on the relationship.
It created resentment.
It prolonged the misery.

Then a friend asked me a surprising question: “If you’d see this painful episode as a gift of learning, what would it contain?”

I stopped in my tracks. Did he mean I had a choice?!

Realizing that was a gift in itself. I had a choice to engage with this break-up experience differently.

There really was an alternative to continuing on my path of blame, resentment, self-critique, regret and misery. And doing so was in my power, and my power alone!

Over the coming weeks, I frequently sat under my favorite tree and looked deeply into what that hitherto unrecognized gift box of learning contained.

What I found were insights and experiences that continue to help me:

• Authentic investments in relationships are never wasted. They bring growth and love — even through unexpectedly painful times.

• Holding on to the memory of the hurt is really unhelpful.

• When I resist the urge to immediately react as I am triggered emotionally, I gain the space to see a fuller, less hurtful picture.

• The process of seeing a bigger picture, remaining attuned to what is triggered in me, reflecting on why that is, and letting it settle before I re-engage, prevents the perpetuation of the initial hurt.

• Rediscovering compassion and love for myself and her allows me to enter other relationships with less ‘baggage’.

Her and I may never meet again.

I am grateful for her having been in my life the way she was.

I am still unpacking the gifts of that break-up,
with love and compassion as my frequent companions.